This super speedy and sort of Sony-made 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD is just $88

Nextorage NEM-PA 1TB — (Image credit: Nextorage)

Nextorage Japan | 1TB | NVMe | PCIe 4.0 | 7,300MB/s read | 6000MB/s write | $149.99 $87.99 at Newegg (save $62)
This is a high-end PCIe 4.0 drive for a little over the price of the far more mainstream WD Black SN770. The difference in read/write speeds for only $18 more cash is rather phenomenal: the Nextorage can reach the upper echelons of PCIe 4.0 bandwidth at 7,300MB/s read and 6,000MB/s write, while the SN770 hits just 5,150MB/s read and 4,900MB/s. If you can spare the cash, I'd make the leap to the Nextorage.

Never heard of Nextorage? Its short history is rather convoliuted, but this is no obscure startup. In fact Nextorage was born in 2019 and founded by Sony as a direct subsidiary of Sony Storage Media Solutions Corporation.

We haven't had a crack at this 1TB model. But the 2TB version landed recently in the PC Gamer labs. Unsurprisingly, these Nextorage drives run Phison E18 controllers and proper 3D TLC NAND over a quad-lane PCIe 4.0 interface.

What you're looking at here, then, is premium TLC NAND PCIe 4.0 performance for a price barely higher than value-orientated drives like the WD Black SN770. The SK Hynix P41 1TB, one of the best PCIe 4.0 drives, is barely any faster but getting on for twice the price.

Jeremy has been writing about technology and PCs since the 90nm Netburst era (Google it!) and enjoys nothing more than a serious dissertation on the finer points of monitor input lag and overshoot followed by a forensic examination of advanced lithography. Or maybe he just likes machines that go “ping!” He also has a thing for tennis and cars.